The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,425 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 51% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 46% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.6 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 62
Highest review score: 100 Badlands
Lowest review score: 0 A Life Less Ordinary
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 5,575 out of 10425
  2. Mixed: 3,741 out of 10425
  3. Negative: 1,109 out of 10425
10425 movie reviews
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  1. Run, Fatboy, Run
    Fatboy nearly succeeds in spite of itself, thanks to Pegg, who makes a character who does some detestable things seem strangely likeable.
  2. Scoop
    As it is, the film perpetually teeters on the edge between a functional vehicle and a train wreck, and whenever Allen opens his mouth, he pushes it violently in the latter direction.
  3. The Exorcist III
    Dread this thick stays with you, long after the shock of projectile vomit and masturbation by crucifix has worn off.
  4. 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi
    Packed with misfiring grenade launchers, blue lens flares, and Mercedes armored cars, 13 Hours makes the best case for Bay as a toy-box aesthete with an abstract sense of motion and color—and the best case against him as an incoherent jingoism fetishist.
  5. The Judge
    The movie isn’t without its pleasures, most of them related to performance. Farmiga, a perennially underrated actor, gives Samantha a measured confidence that sets Hank’s manic cockiness on edge, and Billy Bob Thornton does an effective variation on a slimy archetype as the prosecutor, Dwight Dickham.
  6. Escape Room: Tournament of Champions
    After 30 or 40 minutes, it becomes clear that, despite a few more callbacks, this is a more-of-the-same sequel, not a next-level sequel.
  7. Buffalo Boys
    Buffalo Boys isn’t terribly concerned with sweeping vistas or slow-burn character development. Its primary function is simply to entertain, which in practical action-movie terms means lots of brawling and lots of blood.
  8. A Lot Like Love
    Kutcher and Peet are a low-wattage pair, with little of the verbal riffing that counts as seduction in most romantic comedies, but they have real chemistry together, and A Lot Like Love happily indulges their silly, juvenile one-upmanship.
  9. Goon: Last of the Enforcers
    A film that’s a lot like the last one, just not quite as funny or endearing. If you loved Goon, you’re gonna kind of like Goon: Last Of The Enforcers.
  10. Secuestro express
    Writer-director Jonathan Jakubowicz does his best Quentin Tarantino impersonation, loading the film with percussively profane dialogue, smug adolescent nihilism, rampant drug use, pop-culture references, homophobic invective, and empty stylistic excess.
  11. Scarlet Diva
    Though Scarlet Diva contains flashes of pungent black humor and self-deprecation, it's hard to know how seriously Argento takes herself, or how much her real life has been inflated for dramatic effect.
  12. The Banger Sisters
    Gets off to a bumpy start and runs into trouble along the way, but once it gets going, it's surprisingly warm and engaging.
  13. Brothers in Arms
    Has little to recommend it. A sterling example of how an unimaginative combination of interviews and archival footage can drain the life from even the most compelling topic, it feels padded at a mere 68 minutes.
  14. Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle
    The film is smart enough to know that verbal humor isn't its strong point, but it doesn't offer much in the way of compensation.
  15. Lady and the Tramp
    Watching the remake over-explain every joke and dramatic beat only increases one’s appreciation for how the original trusted its young audience to understand subtext, satire, and emotional nuance.
  16. The Predator
    Cartoonishly violent and proudly profane, The Predator is like a Hollywood action movie pulled into our reality from an alternate timeline.
  17. Ride
    Hunt’s writing isn’t exactly knocking off Woody Allen (her characters do send text messages, after all), but it shares with Allen a peculiar, stylized imitation of how New Yorkers supposedly sound.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    We the Party
    Van Peebles compensates for his stylistic clunkiness - the film overuses split screens and sometimes looks so bright, it could be a '90s sitcom - with funny, unexpected sparks of life.
  19. Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows
    Ritchie has made a film that's so busy, it starts to become boring.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 42 Critic Score
    Made in America
    Jay Z spends much of the film trumpeting his own keen eye for diversity, without acknowledging the fact that as festival bills go, Made In America is utterly unremarkable—and nowhere near as diverse as he claims.
  21. The Protégé
    Beyond considerable physical presence, Q brings touches of subtlety to a stock character; by the time she makes her eventual, inevitable reference to wanting to get out of the game, there’s a genuine weariness that feels earned enough to bypass the cliché.
  22. Paradise Highway
    As intriguing as the combination of Binoche and Grillo might sound, it would be much more impactful if they shared the screen for more than a handful of scenes. As such, the movie begins with a bang, but it ends with a whimper.
  23. Eaten Alive
    Lacking the eerie plausibility and stylishness of Chainsaw, yet filled with dead dogs, terrorized children, and bound women, it never transcends its Z-grade origins. It's an interesting footnote, and will likely be of interest to hardcore horror fans, but those looking for a lost masterpiece will likely come away disappointed.
  24. The Pick-up Artist
    When the film ends after a mere eighty-one minutes it feels like Toback and company simply gave up and decided to let the audience go home twenty minutes early as a covert apology for the film they just endured, a glum little trifle that fails as both a James Toback movie and a Molly Ringwald vehicle.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    The Real Blonde
    Unfortunately, this slight, dull film would have benefited from a bit more style, as well as substance, as its lame characters and obvious observations never rise too far above the soap operas DiCillo parodies.
  26. TRON: Ares
    The result is a pretty dumb movie with beautiful visual effects, cleanly shot action, and a kickass soundtrack. Wouldn’t it be great if the future of blockbusters was only this bleak?
  27. Bartleby
    Parker's film is flat beyond the flatness appropriate to the story; the conflict between Glover and Paymer follows Melville's original so squarely that it quickly begins to feel like they're going through the motions.
  28. Brother Bear
    Unfortunately, Brother Bear doesn't offer much to marvel at beyond its animation.
  29. Bush's Brain
    Constructed out of poorly supported accusations, vague innuendo, and naked emotional appeals, Bush's Brain has a Rove-esque quality of its own.
  30. Glee: The 3D Concert Movie
    One amusing disadvantage of the crystal-clear, you-are-there 3-D cinematography, and the focus on the audience experience is that in practically every shot, it's easy to pick out off-message concertgoers who are bored, tired, or otherwise disengaged.
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